I think it is safe to say we are now officially gaining some “learning momentum” since yesterday was our third class together in “Writing Theory & Practice” – the foundation course for your MA in Writing Studies degree. Your blog posts continue to enlighten and instruct, and you are making strong connections to the readings as well as to your experiences and innate wisdom. Keep that up each week, and we will all marvel together at the learning “take-aways” once the semester comes to a close.
Remember the Learning Commons (aka – the Library)
Our agenda slides from 9/27/22:
Lauer’s “Introduction to Writing Studies”
It was wonderful to start our discussion this week with some reflective freewriting (a low stakes write-to-learn approach) while connecting with our own memories of how we learned to write, as well as how we were taught to write. I think this is an important reference point to keep in mind as we embark on the journey of considering theory & practice today (and how an understanding of writing has indeed evolved). I am also pleased that we had a chance to apprehend the formal field of Rhetoric & Composition via the Lauer reading – in order to understand our own place in an ever-growing field. Some key issues that reverberate for me based on our reading of Lauer’s ‘Rhetoric & Composition”:
- The fact that in the past rhetoric and reasoning functioned at the center of civic culture (Consider the peril of our working democracy today….what role does rhetoric and reasoning play in civic discourse?)
- The complex relationship between reading & writing (…I think we will turn to this complex relationship over and over again with questions of our own);
- The politics of Literary Studies research/scholarship vs. Writing Studies research/scholarship within the “umbrella” field of English Studies;
- Does writing construct or merely transmit knowledge?;
- Is writing social or individual?;
- The disciplinary politics of writing – how writing is often understood as a teaching practice verses a research pursuit.
What to anticipate for next week’s class?
- Read Writing Comments on Student Papers by John Bean
- Read Ranking, Evaluating, and Liking: Sorting Out Three Forms of Judgment by Peter Elbow
- Blog #3 due before 10/4/22- Reflection on the above Bean & Elbow readings. (Next class on 10/4 in Zoom Room!!)
Finally, here are some useful tips on how to prepare for your ENG 5020 presentation, which will be coming just around the semester’s bend. Gianna will kick off our series on October 25:
